


About face

by Builder



Series: Powers/No Powers Choose-Your-Own-Adventure [6]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Helpful Bucky Barnes, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, No Plot/Plotless, Sickfic, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Vomiting, sunday night football
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-28
Updated: 2017-09-28
Packaged: 2019-01-06 08:13:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12207297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Builder/pseuds/Builder
Summary: Steve's a little overconfident with his ability to stomach leftover snacks...And Bucky's ready to start reprising his old role as caretaker.





	About face

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wiseinnerwhispers](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=wiseinnerwhispers).



> This was a prompt fill from Tumblr (find me @Builder051). It's a little more into the classic sickfic genre than I normally venture, but still tons of fun and a good stretch for my imagination. 
> 
> This is set in powers/no powers choose-your-own-adventure (could be somewhat canon or totally AU, it's up to the reader).

Steve leans back into the couch, hands behind his head, and watches the Minnesota Vikings make a touchdown. 

 

“Yes!”  Clint practically jumps out of his seat, pumping his fist in the air.  His son Cooper, who’s sitting on the couch between Clint and Steve, glances at his father and follows suit.

 

“Why are they your team, again?” Bucky asks, peering around Steve and Cooper to address Clint.

 

“I don’t know.  Thor likes them, so I figured I’d adopt them as my team too.”

 

“For not being that into them, you’re really into them,” Steve observes with a hint of friendly judgmental incoherence.

 

“Yeah, well, what can I say.  Sunday is football day.  And just to throw it back at ya, I don’t think I’ve ever seen two dudes less into a game,” Clint throws back.

 

“It would be different if the Giants were playing,” Bucky provides with a bit of a yawn.

 

Steve reaches over to pat Bucky’s knee.  “Tired already?” He asks quietly.  Bucky’s been doing better lately, but that doesn’t mean the nightmares are completely gone.  The jumbled sleepy groaning had turned to shouting around 4, and they’ve both been awake since then.

 

“I don’t know.  I’m ok,” Bucky replies.

 

“This game’s almost over, if you’re ready to split,” Steve suggests.

 

Bucky shrugs.  “I’m ok,” he repeats.

 

Laura swoops in from the kitchen, picking up bowls of snacks from the coffee table and carting them away. 

 

“You could at least wait until a commercial break,” Clint playfully snipes at his wife as she momentarily stands between him and the TV.

 

“Yeah, yeah, suck it up,” she teases back, rolling her eyes and dancing in place as she loads a bowl of potato chip crumbs under her arm.

 

“Here, let me help you with that,” Steve offers.  He jumps up and grabs the bowl of onion dip and a plate of baby carrots and celery.

 

“I got it,” Laura tries to say.

 

“No, really, you’ve been waiting on us all day,” Steve says.

 

“Now you’re really blocking the view,” Clint complains.  He sticks out his foot to trip Steve as he carries the dishes into the kitchen, but Steve easily sidesteps the obstacle.

 

“I’ll get dinner served in a few minutes, here,” Laura says, gesturing to the potatoes in the oven and crock pot of chili on the counter. 

 

“Thanks for the offer,” Steve replies, “But we should be getting home.  You’ve fed us enough already, and we’ve got a long drive home.  Gotta be up for work tomorrow.  You know the drill.”

 

“Yeah, sure do.  He doing ok?”  She glances at Bucky, still watching the TV in the living room.

 

“Oh, yeah, he’s doing great,” Steve explains.  “You’ve seen how far he’s come getting back to his old self.” Steve paws in the bowl of chips for a couple sizeable crumbs, swipes them in the onion dip, and throws them into his mouth.  “We just had kind of a long night, if you know what I mean.  The nightmares still bug him sometimes.”

 

“I bet they still bug you, too,” Laura says with a sympathetic eyebrow raise.

 

Steve half-shrugs and dips another chip.

 

“You know, that’s been sitting out for over 6 hours.  I’m not sure you want to eat it now.”  Laura snags the bowl of dip from under Steve’s hand and dumps it into the sink. 

 

Steve swallows the chip anyway.  “I’ll be fine.”  He tries to help stack up a few more dishes.  “I think I amgonna drag Bucky home now.  Thanks for everything.  All the hospitality.”

 

“Sure.  You know you’re welcome anytime.”  Laura dries her hands on the seat of her jeans and hurries to find their coats.

 

Steve meanders up to the back of the couch and starts massaging Bucky’s shoulders from behind.  “Ready to run?” He asks.  “I gotta be up early tomorrow.”  He doesn’t really, but it’s an easy out.

 

“Yeah, sure.”  Bucky stands up and claps Clint and Cooper on the shoulder before donning his jacket and following Steve out to the car.

 

They’re on the highway before either of them speak. 

 

“How’s it going?”  Steve’s used to Bucky’s long silences; he just sometimes feels the need to check in to ensure they’re contented stretches of quiet instead of depressed ones.

 

“Fine.  Good.  I’m good,” Bucky says.  “I’m just, I just wonder… I think I like the Giants, since they’re a New York team, but I don’t really remember seeing a lot of football before the war…”

 

Steve shifts slightly in his seat and replies, “Yeah, I don’t think we paid a lot of attention to football…  If you decide you don’t like the Giants, you can always go for the Jets…”  Steve stifles a belch behind his hand.

 

“You drink too much coke or something?”

 

“I’m fine,” Steve automatically replies.  He’s sure he is.  He can’t remember the last time he was sick with anything, not even a sniffle.  The slight grumble in his stomach has to be from an afternoon of munching junk food and ignoring the need for physical activity.  Though even as he commits to the thought, the unsettledness takes a dip toward pain.

 

Dusk is falling.  Steve can see the edges of orange sunset peeking in the corners of his rear view mirror as they sail from the beautiful stuck-in-time Virginia countryside back toward the concrete bustle of the DC suburbs.  He wishes they were travelling west so the beautiful sight could be in front, like a paradise to travel toward.

 

“Maybe we should move to the country,” Steve dreamily suggests.  “Get a farm house like Clint.”

 

“Could,” Bucky says in a doubtful tone.  “But I think we’re city kids.  We could go back to Brooklyn…”

 

They dissolve into a stretch of silence again.  The sun continues to plummet, and the harvest gold glow glints off the car mirrors in a harsher manner, making Steve squint against the assault on his eyeballs.  It’s beginning to make his head hurt, which isn’t coupling well with the tumult in his stomach.  Wave motion is creating white-capped froth against the sides of his abdomen, and it feels as though it’s splashing up into his chest.  Steve tries to stealthily let out another burp, and he tastes the sourness of acid reflux.

 

Then Bucky’s saying something, and Steve’s completely missed it.

 

“Huh?”

 

“Are you ok?”  It’s definitely not what Bucky said the first time.

 

“Sure.  Yeah,” Steve replies.

 

“I think, maybe, you’re not,” Bucky says, his eyes trained on Steve’s face.  “Your stomach hurts, doesn’t it?”

 

“Buck, really, I’m ok,” Steve says.  But internally, he admits to himself that he’s definitely uncomfortable. The first flecks of nausea are starting to materialize under his tongue.

 

“No, you’re not feeling good,” Bucky insists.  “It’s been a long time, but I used to take care of you.  I remember how you’d look when you felt sick.”

 

“That attractive, huh?” Steve asks, attempting to chuckle and swallow at the same time.

 

“If you feel bad, pull over,” Bucky says.

 

“It’s not that bad.”  Steve realizes what he’s let slip as soon as the words leave his mouth.

 

“But you do feel kinda bad.”

 

“Eh.  Kinda.”  It’s not worth disagreeing, now that there’s something like an invisible boa constrictor simultaneously squeezing his stomach and esophagus.

 

“You want me to drive?” Bucky suggests.

 

“You can’t,” Steve says, swallowing a mouthful of bitter saliva.

 

“I can drive,” Bucky says, somewhat defensively.

 

“Yeah, but you don’t have a license,” Steve reminds him.  “I’m gonna be fine.  Let’s just…get home.” 

 

The sensation stretching from his stomach to the back of his throat has reached the point of definite illness.  It’s been such a long time since he’s felt sick like this; it brings back flashes of being a weaker version of himself, laid up in bed before the war.  But with Bucky still by his side.

 

He pushes on for five rough minutes.  When the flips of his stomach bring sleepy heaviness to his jaw and vertigo to his forehead, Steve knows he’s screwed.  Sickness is imminent.  A disgustingly wet belch works its way up his throat, and it’s all Steve can do to swallow down what’s quickly becoming the urge to gag. 

 

“You should pull over.”

 

“Yeah, yeah, give me a second…” Steve mutters in a choked whisper.  He takes the next exit without knowing exactly where it leads.  He gulps against a surge of bile and speeds through a yellow light to quickly merge from the off ramp to the main road.  There’s a gas station about a hundred yards down, and Steve pulls into the parking lot.  He sloppily stops the car across two parking spaces and throws the door open just in time to heave onto the dirty cracked asphalt. 

 

“Hey, alright,” Bucky murmurs from behind him.  There’s a click as Bucky releases his seatbelt, then a shuffle as he clambers to his knees to balance his stump arm against Steve’s seat.

 

Steve feels the warm pressure of Bucky’s hand on the back of his neck.  It has the essence of comfort, but also the sensation of pushing him forward into the choking sling of his seatbelt as his stomach continues to evacuate. 

 

He retches hard again, and a torrent of undigested food and soft drinks erupts, splashing over Steve’s knee and the edge of the door frame.  The seatbelt has him bound too far into the vehicle, and he fumbles his trembling fingers over the mechanism to unbuckle himself. 

 

“I’m coming around to your side, ok?”  Bucky pats Steve’s shoulder and scrambles up.  He produces a dizzying ricochet when he slams the passenger side door.

 

In barely a second, he’s around the front end of the car and hovering face to face with Steve.  He quickly leaps backward a step as Steve lets out another flood of vomit onto the toes of Bucky’s boots.

 

“God.  Sorry,” Steve croaks, dabbing his mouth with the back of his hand.  “You’re tired; we should be home…”

 

“It’s ok, you’re just all messed up,” Bucky says, squatting by Steve’s left shoulder. 

 

Steve nods absently in agreement as he tries and fails to suppress another gag that ends up delivering a thin stream of liquid.

 

“You want to go inside?”  Bucky jerks his head in the direction of the gas station’s convenience store.  “Try to get in a bathroom?”

 

“Nah, I’m…I don’t want to move.”  Steve’s hands shake visibly as he rests his face in his palms.

 

“But you’re, I mean, everything else is doing ok?”

 

“I’m not shitting myself, if that’s what you’re asking,” Steve embarrassment coming out in an edge in his voice. 

 

“Hey, whatever’s going on, no problem.  I’m just here to help.”  Bucky says.  He uses a Kleenex from his pocket to swipe a few chunks of sick from Steve’s knee, then keeps his hand comfortingly on his thigh. 

 

“Yeah…”  He retches agonizingly, then spits onto the ground as his body continues to force out air and fluid in painful belches.  “Jesus fucking Christ…”

 

Bucky’s inexplicable lover’s radar seems to inform him that the filthier the curses, the more excruciating Steve’s condition.  His hand finds Steve’s, and he squeezes as tightly as he can.  “Do you think you’ll be ok for a minute?  I’ll grab you some water.  Maybe some antacids.  Or some ginger ale?  I don’t know what’sgonna help the most…”

 

“I’m ok,” Steve gasps through a cough.  He means in general, though he also knows he’s blatantly mistaken.

 

“Ok.  Breathe, alright?  I’ll be right back.”  Bucky forces the Kleenex into Steve’s hand and lovingly strokes the back of his knuckles with his thumb. 

 

Bucky’s gone for all of five minutes, but Steve can’t stop his body from contracting forward again.  Twice he heaves, and twice white-tinged stomach acid falls into what’s becoming an ocean of puke running across the concrete and under the car. 

 

In his peripheral vision, Steve sees Bucky’s strapping one-armed form exiting the store’s glass doors.  He has a plastic shopping bag in the crook of his elbow and his phone pressed between his cheek and his shoulder. 

 

“Yeah…” Steve hears Bucky muttering as he approaches the car.  “Ok, I’ll let you know if anything changes.  Ok.  Thanks.  Bye.”  He slaps the shopping bag around his hips as he fumbles the phone back into his pocket, then he bends over Steve’s back again.

 

“Alright, how’s it going,” Bucky asks.

 

“Oh, god,” Steve groans, fighting a hiccup.  “Just…so nauseous.”  He takes a stabilizing breath.  “Who were you talking to?”

 

“Just Laura,” Bucky says.  “I wanted to let her know, in case someone else was getting sick.”

 

Steve gives a thick swallow.  “’S nice of you…”

 

“And I, well, you know I’m kind of rusty on this,” Bucky admits quietly.  “I mean, you’ve been doing so much for me, but it’s been a long time since I’ve done this.  I want to make sure I’m, you know, doing it right.”

 

“I don’t think there’s a lot you can do,” Steve murmurs, bringing a fist to his mouth.  “What did Laura say?”

 

“To push fluids.  Get you home.  Go to the ER or call Sam to start an IV if it gets too bad.”  Bucky sets the shopping bag on top of the car and starts rummaging in it.  “And to remind you to not eat something if she tells you not to eat it.” 

 

Steve glances up and sees Bucky’s smile.

 

“Yeah.  Point taken,” Steve says.

 

Bucky squats down to face him again, squeezing a bottle of water between his knees as he screws off the cap.  “How long’s it been since you brought anything up?”

 

“I don’t know.  A few minutes,” Steve gauges.  “But feels like I could go again any second.”

 

“Here.”  Bucky offers the water bottle.

 

Steve eyes him doubtfully and gives a small shake of his head.

 

“Better to puke up water than just acid.”

 

Steve has the slightly nostalgic feeling that he’d told Bucky the same thing not many months ago.  The full scope of the role-reversed scenario suddenly hits him, and Steve’s struck with the desire to be cooperative, though his body still seems to have other ideas.  He accepts the water bottle from Bucky and loosely grips it in his sweaty, shaky hand.

 

“Yeah.  Ok,” he sighs.  “Just…not really appealing.”

 

“Take a couple sips and I’ll drive you home,” Bucky encourages.

 

“You still can’t drive.”  Steve brings the bottle to his lips, the condensation beading on its surface making it slick in his hand and against his mouth.  The water is refreshing, but swallowing gives him the distinct impression he’s forcing his system to work in the opposite direction of its current preference.

 

“I can drive.  It’s a medical emergency, and I won’t get pulled over,” Bucky insists.

 

The water immediately hits Steve’s stomach, and the bubbling reaction it seems to set off is less than pleasant feeling.  He burps under his breath.

 

“Ok?”

 

“Maybe,” Steve says.  “It’s not setting that great.”

 

“Well, you seem ok for now.  You think maybe you’re ready to get going?”  Bucky rescues the plastic bag from the top of the car and stoops to offer Steve his stump shoulder as support.  With difficulty, Steve accepts the handhold and pulls himself to standing, remaining slightly bent at the waist with one arm protectively draped around his middle.

 

They sidle around the large splash of vomit on the ground and somehow maneuver to the passenger side.  Steve can barely concentrate on moving his feet as he trembles around the front of the car.  He sinks into the plush seat as soon as Bucky guides him to bend his knees.  He swallows hard as the water he swallowed threatens to come back up.

 

“Here,” Bucky says, reading Steve’s panicked expression.  He reaches over Steve to place a container of Tums in the cup holder, then hands over the empty plastic bag. 

 

Steve imagines the car’s tires streaking through the lake of sick as Bucky reverses out of Steve’s awful parking job.  He doesn’t look to confirm his prediction.  With his palm pressed firmly into the steering wheel’s 12 o’clock position, Bucky steers them easily back onto the highway.

 

It’s only 25 minutes or so before they reach the exit for Falls Church, but Steve still can’t handle the smooth motion of the car on the road.  He leans his head into the window for as long as he can, but ends up hanging over his own lap as saliva trails from his lower lip into the crinkly plastic bag. 

 

“You’re good,” Bucky says, shooting Steve a sympathetic glance.  Steve nods and belches out a mouthful of acidic water.  Hardly anything more comes up, but he stays hunched, not trusting himself to move.  At the first stoplight they get to, Bucky takes his hand off the wheel to stroke his fingers down Steve’s back.

 

Once they’re safely parked in the garage, Bucky unlocks the front door and Steve immediately slips past him to set up camp in the downstairs bathroom.  He kneels in front of the toilet and buries his face in the bowl, folding his arms over his aching head.

 

“What do you need?” Bucky asks from the doorway.

 

“Nothing, I don’t know,” Steve says around the threat of a gag.  “If you just want to come sit…”

 

“Yeah.  Of course.  With ya till the end of the line, remember?”

**Author's Note:**

> Prompts, please! Toss them my way on here or on Tumblr. My to-do list is getting short and I'm starving for some serious angst.


End file.
